Microsoft Updates Azure Functions Serverless-Computing Architecture to Support Java
Microsoft has recently announced at Java One that Java support is coming to Azure Functions serverless-computing architecture fulfilling one of the most eager requests of the developers.
According to Microsoft executives, The Company has redesigned the architecture of Azure functions to support different programming languages and Java is the first preference to give the modified architecture a successful trial.
Now Java programmers can enjoy all the benefits provided by the Azure functions with existing Java tools only. Before we go deep, this is necessary to understand Azure Functions architecture and benefits for the same.
Azure Functions – Accelerate your app development with event-driven serverless architecture
Focus on app development, not on the infrastructure
This is an event-driven program that accelerates your app development and consumes selected resources only whenever required. The best part is that you need to focus on apps only not the infrastructure. You don’t have to think much about server maintenance and server provisioning. In other words, Azure is a full-fledged serverless computing platform with the assurance of maximum reliability and security.
Choose your own style of development
You can start coding with your favorite programming languages like C#, Python, PHP, JavaScript, Java, etc. Writing code and starting app development in your preferred programming language will speed up the overall deployment of the product.
Enjoy Round the clock processing with Azure functions
As we have discussed already Azure functions support event-based processing to accelerate the overall app building and app deployment. One of the biggest advantages of Azure functions is round the clock processing to manage the task efficiently. For example –After every fifteen minutes, you need to clean database table based on pre-defined business logic.
The next example is a little more technical that explains event-based processing for the serverless code. Think of the condition when you execute the serverless code, it will read all the test log files that are recently added to the Azure blob storage container and transform the same data into rows that can be quickly added to the SQL database.
The services developers can enjoy with Azure Functions
The other services that can be enjoyed with Azure Functions include – Timer-based processing, SaaS even processing, Serverless web app developments, Serverless mobile back-ends, Stream processing and Bot messaging in real-time, and event-driven processing, etc. If we talk about the other popular brands then Amazon AWS Lambda is perhaps the best known serverless service and Oracle has also jumped into the serverless fray with their product ‘Fn project’.
What attracts the Java developers most towards Azure Functions?
The good news for Java programmers is that they can enjoy all the benefits provided by the Azure functions with existing Java tools only. For example – You can start with Maven plug-in that is Core Azure functions tool to deploy Java programs locally on any platform.
Instead, Java developers can also start with several IDEs like Eclipse, NetBeans, and Visual Studio Code etc. to develop or debug the Azure functions locally. Here is a quick example of Azure functions created locally with Maven plug-in and Visual Studio Code
Visual Studio Code is a seamless lightweight and cross-platform editor that helps developers in writing Java apps by integrating Azure Functions together. Developers can work in different programming languages while writing programs with Visual Studio Code. The development and debug support offered by the editor is just wonderful. Let us have a quick look how to design serverless functions in Java with Visual Studio Code.
To create your first serverless Java application with Azure Functions, start with different Java Plug-ins and Java IDEs today. For this purpose, you are strongly recommended to join java training program to know about the basics and advanced concepts of the Java programming language right away.